|Past La 
CHAPTER I. 
GENERAL GEOLOGICAL VIEW OF SELSEY AND 
BRACKLESHAM BAY. 
In giving to the geological collector a description of this most inter- 
esting locality, where the Eocene division of the Tertiary period is 
so extensively developed, I trust I may be allowed, before entering on 
the peculiar subject of my work, to devote a few words to the early and 
known history of this celebrated peninsula ; one of the places where 
Christianity was first taught in this country*, and where. as Dr. Johnson 
has so beautifully expressed on a similar occasion, ‘‘ savage clans and 
roving barbarians derived the benefits of knowledge and the blessings 
of religion. ‘To abstract the mind from all local emotion would be im- 
possible if it were endeavoured, and would be foolish if it were possible: 
whatever makes the past, the distant, or the future predominate over 
the present, advances us in the dignity of thinking beings. Far from 
me and from my friends be such frigid philosophy as may conduct us 
indifferent and unmoved over any ground which has been dignified by 
wisdom, bravery or virtue.” 
Selsey is the southernmost point of the county of Sussex, and was 
most likely visited at a very early period by the inhabitants of the 
* The historical account is taken principally from Camden, Dallaway and Baxter. 
